The Grand Chicago Hotel Analysis

In many movies the audience can fairly rely on everything they are seeing. The audience is usually the first to know something important, sometimes even before some of the characters do. Though in The Grand Budapest Hotel, directed by Wes Anderson, we can only rely on everything the narrator is telling us. In the first couple of minutes of the film, the audience is transported into a frame narrative otherwise known as a story within a story. This entire film is based off of the memory of a man being told a story from our main character, Zero Moustafa. This is likely to be an unreliable source were many details may be left out or misconstrued. The Grand Budapest Hotel creates distinctions of memory, uses setting to emphasize this distinction, and utilizes lighting to show emotion. …show more content…
In the scene where we are first introduced to Agatha, she and zero are on a date and step onto a merry go round. We can see that it 's dark out, but as they stand on the ride, the lighting helps you to focus on the two of them. As the lights dim down around her and Zero as they go around in circles, silhouetting Agatha. This shows us how much Zero cherishes his memories of her. Another example to prove this point is when Zero first begins to tell his story. He sits at the table with the hotel guest, our first narrator, and the camera focuses in on Zero’s face. As he begins to speak the lights surround his head dim down to show the importance of what he 's about to say.
The Grand Budapest Hotel shows the significance of characters’ memories, shows how memory can utilize the setting in a story, and manipulates lighting in setting the emotion of a memory. Normally, when frame narrative is involved in a story, the narrator can be unreliable. But in The Grand Budapest Hotel, neither our first narrator nor the audience disputes Zero’s story or perspective while he tells his story, seeing how it bears so much importance to the